Fishless Cycle Day 12: Please Advise

M

MidnightPyro

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Jun 21, 2005
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I'm on Day 12 of the Fishless Cycle. I did all of the water tests today, and here's the results...
Ammonia: 0 ppm/negative test
Nitrite: 4.5 ppm
Nitrate: 7.5 ppm
8.3ish pH

The pH seems extraoridinarily high to me, and I'm not too sure about the Nitrite or the Nitrate levels. There's no fish currently in the tank, and I have a filter capable of filtering 30 gallons (it's a 20 gallon tank). At this point, I'm wondering what to do next. Any advice would be greatly appreciated
 
You're on your way. pH swings are normal during the cycle process. :)
 
Yeah just let it go, My tank cycled in 2weeks with some plants in there (they are dead now) and established filter media.
 
I took the sample to my local LFS to test to compare to mine (although I hate going there because they never understand what a fishless cycle is and always try to sell me some new chemical). They got the following results...
Ammonia - 0 ppm
Nitrite - 3.0 ppm
Nitrate - 40 ppm
pH - 8.4
Total Hardness - 425 ppm
Total Alkalinity Buffering Capacity - 300 ppm

So according to my last test, and their test and advice...the nitrite level is dropping, although still not close to acceptable range. Nitrate is right where it should be, although a bit high but okay, and pH is waaay out of sync. They tried to sell me Proper PH, but I didn't buy it considering I never like messing with the pH anyway, and figure I should invest $10 in fish instead of on stupid chemicals :D

Anyways, after seeing everything in the too high range, I did a 10% water change. Keep in mind this is the first water change I've done ever on the sucker, and I started out with a waaaaaay too high dosage of ammonia, putting the ammonia at like 7 ppm to start the cycle, so I'd assume now that there's finally bacteria in there, the nitrate and the nitrite will spike more than it should. So after my 10% water change, I ran the pH and nitrite tests, and everything is still about the same, but that's okay. Added in the new water and filled the aquarium up again and shoved in some stress coat and a maintenance dose of Cycle (I payed $11 for it, I'm sure as hell going to use it while I still have it :P) I'm going to take the LFS's advice for once and just wait a week and let everything level off
 
I'd not bother with the Cycle, as I understand it, it doesn't introduce the correct strain of bacteria anyway. If you add anything, make it Bio-Spira...it would shorten the cycling process considerably. In terms of the pH, you should see it come down again when the numbers normalize. Your nitrite and nitrate numbers seem very reasonable for a fishless cycle, but keep an eye on them. It's not unusual for the nitrates to skyrocket to or beyond the limit of your test kit, and you will eliminate those with a large water change once you complete the cycle. Nitrites, though, can stall the cycle if they get out of testing range. The trick is to only dose half the original amount of ammonia once you start seeing nitrites, that should help keep the numbers in check. If they do go too high, then do a partial water change.

Edit: One question for clarification... Have you been dosing with ammonia everyday, or just the one time?
 
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I'm not sure why you're adding stress coat or why you did the water change if you don't have fish? (Maybe I missed something?)

I cycled a 5 gallon (QT) tank in about 2 weeks using just pure ammonia and no water changes. Just add your ammonia everyday and have a little patience and it will sort itself out. :)
 
I just added my first dosage of ammonia, and that was it. I shot it up to 8 ppm, and it stayed there for 2-3 days. Tested it 10 days later, and there were nitrites and nitrates in the water with no ammonia, so I haven't added any since. I dunno about stress coat though, that's a good point.
 
If you only dose once and then wait for the nitrites to get to zero, you risk starving the ammonia-eating bacteria. You need to add ammonia daily once it starts dropping in order to keep the process going. Once your nitrites are at zero, dose once more to test to see if ammonia and nitrite get to zero within 24 hours. Then do a large water change to reduce nitrates to a safe level, and add fish.

Here is a really good "instruction manual" for fishless cycling:
http://www.aquamaniacs.net/forum/cms_view_article.php?aid=31
 
So even though I've already had a nitrite/nitrate spike, and still in the spike, I should keep adding a daily dosage of ammonia?
 
Yes. Since you've gone so long without adding ammonia, though, you may need more than half the original dose to build up the bacteria. Do read the article I link to above...it explains the whole process way better than I ever could. :)
 
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